how has it changed your mind & perspective?

Question

What's a book you have read that has changed your mind and perspective and what has it taught u and why is it important to our intellectual thought?

Answer 1

Well I read this book last year that changed alot of my outlook on people. I really started to see how impersonal,and, rude people can be to others when they think they are better or right. Its called The Atonement Child by Francine Rivers.
I recommend it to anybody who has a wanting to read a good meaningful book.

Answer 2

The character of Quentin Compson in William Faulkner's THE SOUND & THE FURY was an extremely deep and interesting character whose thoughts really spoke to me as a person.

Throughout his section of the book, which is told in stream of consciousness, he fights with the effects of Time on the world. He hates knowing that time destorys everything, especially emotion. He can't stand the thought that what seemed important today won't matter tomorrow. So he fought against the ravages of Time, and made it his mission to escape it, as shown through his suicide.

As a college student and teenager, I've spent a lot of time thinking about what will happen to me when I'm no longer young. I'm constantly wondering if I'm going to forget about what it was like to be young. I don't want to say goodbye to the friends I've made. As with Quentin, sometimes I wish I could stop time at a moment when I'm completely happy with the people I love the most. I wouldn't get older, my body wouldn't begin to age and fall apart, and none of my family and friends would leave me. When Quentin talked about all of these things, I felt like Faulkner knew I would read it someday.

Of course, you cannot stop time, and in the end that's best. We're meant to get older, and lose some things that we love the most. We can't exist outside of this decaying world, so accepting that helps one grow up and enjoy what time we do have. Quentin ultimately self-destructed in light of his inevitable failure. I learned what a waste of life it is to fight against the forces of Time.

Answer 3

Thomas Sowell's Basic Economics. I know, it sounds like a bore, and I was NOT happy when my dad forced me to read it. However it shows how economics are the driving force behind all we do and how trying to manipulate that, whether for the good (like rent controls) or the bad (price gouging) is detrimental in the long run. It made me angrier at society than anything I've ever read.

Answer 4

The first chronicles of Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever, made me think a lot about hope and despair, power and responsibility, and passion and vulnerability.